


The Art of Online Dating

by CCNSurvivor



Category: Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (TV 2018)
Genre: F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Online Dating, Romance, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-18
Updated: 2019-01-18
Packaged: 2019-10-12 09:54:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17465288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CCNSurvivor/pseuds/CCNSurvivor
Summary: After giving up Letty, Sabrina and Ambrose witness how miserable Zelda is and decide to do her a favour by signing her up to an online dating site. The same website one Mary Wardwell once used before Lilith killed her and took on her appearance.





	The Art of Online Dating

**Author's Note:**

> \- carefully trying my hand at a Madam Spellman fic that isn't just smut - join me for the ride? I'd love your support :)  
> \- George, Coco and Scottie are Gershwin, Chanel and Fitzgerald  
> \- Zelda can be a nickname for Griselda, Link is explained - the name is awful on purpose  
> \- partially inspired by the tumblr prompt: "Zelda gets drunk and tells Sabrina and Ambrose that when she was   
>  younger she was a slut"

Prologue:

 

  
It’s a Friday night and Whiskey is flowing hotly and comfortably through her veins. It’s like the familiar touch of a favourite scarf wrapped around her shoulders, like the recognition of magic within herself. Thick and heavy with pressure which thankfully bans all coherent thought into blissful oblivion.

It’s enough to fill her for the time being, to erase the wretched void that otherwise accompanies her days.

Since the upheaval at Yule.

Since Leticia.

She’s somewhere in the empty parlour, swaying to a tune that softly drifts forth from a gramophone. A little bit like swing, a little bit like slow dance. Her full, red hair is far more luxurious than the rest of her appearance. Granted, she has painted her lips and eyes, but she hasn’t made it far beyond her silky nightgown and robe.

“Hey Aunt Zee, what are you doing?”

“Oh, Sabrina!” She twirls around, never missing a step and nearly laughs at the expression on her niece’s face. “Well, lighten up, child. Since when have you become so gloomy?”

Out of thin air, she fetches a single cigarette and its holder and lights it with the power of her magic alone. Mists of smoke drift around them.

“We’re hardly gloomy, auntie.” It’s her nephew now, appearing by Sabrina’s side. “We’re just checking in on you to make sure you’re having a nice time.”

She catches the lie immediately; it tastes like stale tobacco. Her eyes narrow. She ceases to move. “This is Hilda’s doing, isn’t it? She’s put you up to this!”

Ambrose doesn’t tilt his head, but he catches his cousin’s eye nonetheless. And before she can open her mouth to answer, he’s crossed the room and linked arms with Zelda.

“You’re right. This is a perfect evening for dancing. Like that night in Paris? With George and Coco and Scottie? Surely you remember?”

She’s swept up into his arms and together they venture across the floor. Soon, what was once a slow dance, changes as, too, does the music. There’s a faster beat, the noisy flare of a trumpet and intricate solos of a piano. It’s jazz and it’s hot. They’re spinning, spinning out of control until the whole room blurs before her and she has to catch her breath.

Somebody guides her towards a chaise longue on which she reclines as though she is some long-forgotten star. It really is terribly unfortunate that no one offers to refill her drink or light a cigarette. She can barely remember what happened to the old one.

“So…Paris?” Sabrina ventures and Zelda exhales as though she can devour the potency that possessed a room back then.

“Oh, we had a marvellous time, didn’t we?” She’s drunk on herself, drunk on her own energies. “And all those lovely young men, tripping over themselves to win our attention. Ever so unsubtle. And the women, with their perfect smooth skin and breasts…oh their breasts…”

“Uh, Auntie Zee, I think that’s probably all I wanna hear about _that_.”

“And just for the record, I didn’t see any of this. Well, what? Don’t look at me like that. The parties were big, it was easy to lose sight of one another. And by the sounds of it, I really dodged a bullet.”  
  
The conversation solely belongs to Ambrose and Sabrina now, and their voices are overlapping, drowning out the music which just won’t do, because it’s creating the most wonderful images in her mind. Of lovers entwined, of sweat and need and pleasure. Oh, to be young again!

She cannot remember how, but somehow she’s on her feet, if also a little unsteady. The room is still swaying, lurching, tilting.

“What is so shocking, darling? That your aging aunt was once desired? That she was a tart who could have anyone she wished?”

She wags her finger at her niece who seems to escape her focus.

Right. Left.

Falling away.

The ground tilts one last time and then everything goes black.

* * *

 

 

Consciousness dawns with the ominous cawing of birds in the distance. A breeze grazes her hair, her face. Icy cold like the touch of death. With effort, she rolls onto her side and presses her body into the mattress. Her head aches, and January mornings possess a stinging, unforgiving chill. It seeps through her blankets and nightgown until it nestles itself into her marrow. It worsens the pain that seems to be cracking her skull in two. The rest of her resembles a fabric of nothingness once more. Slowly, she exhales her woes into the pillow. Alcohol, that once tasted sweet and tempting, now coats her tongue like burning acid. It’s sour and unrelenting.

Like failure.

This isn’t the first time she’s passed out drunk, but it’s the first time in a while that she realises how awful the morning after truly is. There are fragments of memory here and there, though she never lingers long on them. The rest is lost in a haze.

Zelda stays in bed until she feels certain she can summon up enough composure to face her family. But it’s her need for coffee that finally pushes her to stand up. Thankfully, the room has ceased to spin, but her head still feels fuzzy and thin like paper. She takes a sip of water from a glass somebody has placed on her nightstand. Swallowing is somehow a challenge. Then she reaches for her robe and moves downstairs.

There is no sign of Hilda – she tries to ignore the bitter taste of her absence – but her niece and her nephew are waiting for her at the kitchen table, their heads close together. The whispering fades into silence the minute they notice her which really should have been a red flag. But she cannot possibly turn observations into coherent thought yet, and driven by her craving she goes in search of coffee and leaves them to it. By the time she’s filled up a mug and turned back around to face them, a laptop is sitting on the table.

“Good morning, Aunt Zee,” Sabrina greets her brightly – which should have been the second red flag. “Did you sleep well?”

“I slept like the dead, dear child,” she replies, her voice a flimsy, coarse thread.

She pushes her nose deep into the cup and permits the heavy scent of coffee to fill her nostrils. Then she drinks. It’s still not easy, but the rich, sharp taste brings clarity.

“Well, that’s excellent. We were hoping you’d say so, because we have a little surprise for you.”

_Now_ alarm bells are shrilling in her head, and with a darkening frown she fixes them both with a look that could wither plants. “I am certain you’re well aware that I despise surprises?”

Conveniently, they both avoid all eye contact and choose not to answer. Instead, Ambrose leans forward and hits a button on the laptop that sends an image flashing up.

Suddenly, her own face gazes back at her. And above it, a headline reads: Grislink Selig.

“I assume this is some kind of joke?”

Zelda leans back in her chair and helps herself to another hearty sip of coffee. She doesn’t understand what she’s seeing there before her, and she’s not in the mood for obscure humour.

“No, Aunt Zelda. Actually it’s quite serious. You’re obviously unhappy since you’ve decided to give up Letty. And every time you get drunk you start reminiscing about “the good old times” and the relationships you cultivated and… _unfortunately_... also the affairs you had.”

The atmosphere between them is brittle like glass, and fleetingly she wonders if it has already become cracked beyond repair.

“It’s clear to us that you’re lonely. Please, Aunt Zee, don’t argue. You can barely look at Auntie Hilda without giving her a hard time for dating Dr Cerberus. It’s okay, we’ve all been there. I mean, Harvey and I…”

Sabrina trails off and Zelda doesn’t know what’s worse, the heartache that’s clearly haunting her niece, that she has selfishly ignored and neglected, or the pity she finds in her tone. Heat singes her cheeks, but unwavering poise enables her to hold eye contact through it all.

“Well, anyway. We’ve set up a profile for you on a dating website. Even if you don’t find love, you might just make a friend.”

And just like that, all heat leaves her body and in its wake blossom the first particles of ice. Slowly, she slides her eyes away from niece and nephew and towards her own image that’s smiling pleasantly at her still from the monitor of the laptop.

“Grislink Selig,” she reads, this time aloud.

“Yes, a play on your name and…” Sabrina pauses and glances at Ambrose.

“It was my idea, Auntie. A pun. Link is the protagonist in the Legend of Zelda games. And since you're searching for the missing link...”

She barely hears them, for her ears are reverberating with the facts that are lining the right side of the page next to her picture.

 

**About:**

Early 50ies  
Bisexual  
5' 5"  
Curvy  
Red head

 

**Likes:**

Gardening  
Dancing  
Feminism  
Religion  
  
**Dislikes:**  
  
Tardiness  
Uncleanliness  
Questionable morals  
Hip Hop

 

Is this it, she wonders. Her whole person encompassed in one ridiculous, made-up name and a handful of bullet points?

Slowly, she blinks. Tears of anger and sadness threatening to sting her eyes.

Shouldn’t there be more?

Couldn’t there be?

For a split-second – the flutter of a heartbeat, the furl of a finger, the crackle of the first spark of magic – she envisions a scenario that’s entirely different. Where there are openings, possibilities, options. Then she swiftly slams the laptop shut and with it strangles all fledgling, foolish emotions.

“No,” she says. And for the moment, that is that.


End file.
